06 February 2013

Bird Park Revisited

Around two years ago, one of the first things I did when relocating to Subic was to do a recce of the area to see what was what.  One place I stumbled upon was a bird park.  The big iron gates at the entrance were closed and the sign for the park was dilapidated and falling down but as there was no one around I went in through the missing fence and had a wander.

At the time I wasn't sure if it was permanently closed or I had just turned up at the wrong time but it was deserted and there seemed not to be any staff around, although it appeared that the birds were being fed - it was like a avian Marie Celeste.  

The place was pretty run down and in a bad state of disrepair, which was a shame because it was apparent that it has been quite grand in its day and there were quite some exotic species of birds remaining.

Since then I had really bothered going back, assuming it had either completely fallen apart or closed, but recently decided to show someone around to see what had become of the place. The big iron gates were still there and closed but there were some staff milling around who pointed us to the ticket office (accessed through the same missing fence.  The entrance fee was a modest Php50 (£0.77) and included a free demonstration of jungle survival skills as the bird park was located next to a place called J.E.S.T (Jungle Environment Jungle Training) Camp. 

The bird park had already undergone some renovation and in the process of being renovated and was a vast improvement of what it was and the variety of birds was very good.  Whilst not of the same calibre of the Jurong Bird Park in Singapore or the one in KL it was nonetheless one of the better attractions I've been to in Subic, if not the Philippines.





No comments:

Post a Comment